


the princess was chained for a reason

by MissMoonshine



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Battle of Hogwarts, I Don't Even Know, Revenge, Sisters
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-06
Updated: 2020-06-06
Packaged: 2021-03-04 05:01:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,091
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24577969
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MissMoonshine/pseuds/MissMoonshine
Summary: 'You've spilled enough Black blood, Bella. It's only fair that you die by the hand of a Black too.'or the one where Andromeda is the one to take down her sister
Comments: 2
Kudos: 7





	the princess was chained for a reason

**Author's Note:**

> Well. I'm in a writing phase again and this was just the first thing I sat down to actually put to paper. It was written in one go, just a little something that I had been thinking about for a while...so here you go!
> 
> A gigantic thank you for beta reading goes to the wonderful @BookAndCatLady - you're the best!
> 
> Now, that's it from me, enjoy!
> 
> Disclaimer: I only borrowed the characters, I don't own them!

‘You killed my daughter.’ Bellatrix whipped around, stared at the woman who spoke. A grin spread on her face. 

‘Poor Annie, let her muddy baby go, look who you could have been!’ She sing-songed and cackled but the woman across from her didn’t even flinch, didn’t do anything except stare at her with a cold hatred Bellatrix had only ever seen on her own face.

‘You killed my daughter,’ Andromeda repeated and took another step towards Bellatrix. Around them, the battle continued, yet they were in a bubble of calm that only existed for the two of them. Just Molly Weasley, who had been storming towards Bellatrix after nearly seeing her own daughter get killed, seemed to have stopped for a moment to watch them.

‘And what are you going to do, little Annie?’ Bellatrix grinned, oblivious to the battle around them. ‘Kill me?’

‘Yes.’ For the blink of an eye, Bellatrix seemed surprised by Andromeda’s cold answer, then her grin widened and her eyes flashed. 

‘Oh, little Annie thinks she can kill me!’ she taunted. ‘But I think I’ll send you after your precious traitor daughter - sister!’ The last word was spat before Andromeda and if it had been someone else, they might have reacted to Bellatrix’ taunts - yet Andromeda didn’t seem fazed in the slightest.

‘I think,’ she said instead, her cold voice the opposite of her sister’s manic shrieks, ‘that you have spilled enough Black blood. If anyone is a disgrace to the family, it’s you, Bella. You killed father. You killed Uncle Alphard. You killed Sirius. And now you killed my daughter. It’s only just that you should fall by the hand of a Black too. See it as revenge, dear sister.’

‘You really think you can kill me.’ For the first time since Andromeda had interrupted her last duel, Bellatrix seemed genuinely surprised. The madness was still flickering in her eyes but there was something else too, a grudging admiration, perhaps, that Andromeda dared to proclaim such a thing. It lasted only for a moment before it disappeared again and she lunged forward, wand raised. ‘Let’s see then, sister, shall we? Crucio!’

Andromeda never even bothered to raise her wand to deflect the curse, rather stepped to the side to avoid it. She did the same for the next three curses, all of different, sickening colours, that came flying at her before she, too, finally raised her wand and their duel began.

The first few curses Bellatrix had flung at her sister she had still shouted but once Andromeda began firing back, without making a sound once, she too fell back into the habit of silent curses. It was eerie to watch and slowly, the battle around them subsided so everyone could watch the last two duels. 

* * *

Harry Potter would, much later, say that he had never seen anything quite like it. Of course, Voldemort duelling the Professors was impressive but somehow, it seemed like naught compared to the battle of the Black sisters. For one, it was conducted completely in silence, not a single spell was spoken. Their wands whipped through the air so fast that they were but a blur and even Andromeda, who was known as the ‘good’ Black, was firing curses the likes of which he had never seen. Curses that, by the way Bellatrix desperately jumped out of their way, were everything but light magic. 

Someone, probably Molly Weasley, had thrown up a shield around their fight that seemed to absorb the stray curses instead of letting them fly into the mass of students and onlookers who were so fixed on the duel that they forgot everything else. 

Both witches were moving so fast that it was almost impossible to determine which witch was which, blurs in black and grey as they danced around each other. Even if Harry had wanted to interfere, he couldn’t have done it, not without a good chance of accidentally hitting the wrong witch. It seemed as if with every second, their curses got faster, deadlier - and then, ll of a sudden, everything stopped.

It took Harry, everyone in the hall, really, a moment to realise why the duel had come to such an abrupt halt. A figure was stumbling towards the circle the sisters had claimed, a woman with long blond hair and a furious expression, a woman who had done nothing but shout ‘STOP IT!’. 

Without hesitation, Narcissa Malfoy crossed the protection line and stepped right between her sisters. Both greeted her with equally cold, calculating stares and Harry thought that perhaps, his very first assessment of Andromeda’s looks hadn’t been so off after all, considering how eerily similar both she and Bellatrix looked in that moment.

‘Stay out of this, Cissy,’ Bellatrix hissed, never lowering her wand from where it was pointed at Andromeda.

‘Stop it, both of you -’

‘This is between Bella and me, Cissy. Get out of our way.’

‘I will not -’

Both sisters made the movement, a strange flick of their wands, so effortless and thoughtless that they must have done it a thousand times. Perhaps they had, a lifetime ago - old habits die hard, they say. Narcissa’s eyes widened, then she gasped and stumbled several paces back, out of the circle again and right into Luna Lovegood, who grasped her arm and pulled her up, her eyes never leaving the battle before them.

Andromeda and Bellatrix had been still for a long moment before they snapped back, as if they had both been somewhere else for a minute. Perhaps the eeriest, strangest part of the entire battle between them was the mirrored synchronicity they moved with, as if they had never done anything else. It was impossible to say who would win.

Once they had snapped back to life after their sisters’ interruption, they didn’t lose any more time, took up their fight again right where they had left it off. 

This time, Harry at least thought he could see a difference in how they moved. Bellatrix was dancing around, playing, brilliant but mad. Andromeda was on light feet too but unlike her sister, every one of her movements had a purpose, a reason. It was an odd notion, but Harry felt himself strangely reminded of the good swan vs bad swan moment in swan lake, Odette vs Odile, one mad and determined, the other one calm and just as powerful.

Then, once again, everything came to a sudden stop. Someone screamed. Narcissa again. The protection spell surrounding the Black sisters crumbled down, Mrs Weasley and Mrs Malfoy rushing towards the center.

There was a tangle of black and grey robes on the ground, an indistinguishable mess of wild curls. For a moment, they were struggling on the floor, wands abandoned where they had fallen. Then the movement stilled and everything fell silent again.

Their spells had met midair, clashing, backfiring, striking both their wands from their hands. Bellatrix had plunged towards her sister, barreling into her, both of them toppeling onto the ground like children in play as they struggled to get control over the other one.

Then, suddenly, Bellatrix froze as she felt something hard press against her corset. Her eyes widened in realisation as she tried to scramble back and found herself frozen in place, unable to move. Andromeda had one hand tangled in her hair, the other one somewhere between their bodies. She had always been good at body binding spells, with a wand or without.

‘I told you I would kill you tonight, Bella,’ she whispered in her ear before pulling her head back by her hair so she could look into her sister’s eyes. ‘This is for my daughter.’

Bellatrix gasped, her eyes wide and suddenly afraid as she stared into her sister’s face. She didn’t need to look down to know what Andromeda had done.

‘You...killed me.’

‘Yes.’

‘Maybe you’re a Black after all.’ The grin that had stolen it’s way back onto her face froze suddenly as she slumped down onto her sister, dead. 

The strangled silence only lasted for a moment before someone dropped on their knees and tried to pull them apart and Andromeda pushed Bellatrix aside onto the floor next to her to sit up. Narcissa fell onto her knees, turning over her sister’s dead body, a sob fighting its way up as she saw the dagger in her heart. Molly Weasley pressed Andromeda’s wand back into her hand and helped her friend up. Neither of them acknowledged the two other Black sisters on the floor as Andromeda, her voice still as cold and hollow as before, turned towards the last ongoing duel between Voldemort himself and the three Professors. 

‘Your lieutenant is dead, Tom!’ She called. ‘It’s time for you to give up.’

Everyone knows how the final battle between Tom Riddle and Harry Potter went but of those who saw it, none will forget the fight between the two eldest Black sisters either. 

* * *

After the battle, Andromeda only stayed for as long as she had to to help where it was immediately necessary before she left again to pick up her grandson from her in-laws, where she had dropped him off hours ago, when the spells set to tell her about her daughters well-being had all stopped wheezing.

Narcissa Malfoy took a long time to forgive her sister for killing her other sister, even if she knew that she would have done the same, had Bellatrix killed her son. In the end, that knowledge won out and she turned back to the last remnants left of the noble and most ancient house of Black.

Kingsley Shacklebolt made sure that Andromeda Tonks was, in regular intervals, invited to the Auror training program to teach their recruits how to duel properly. No one objected, who wouldn’t want to learn from the woman who had single handedly defeated Voldemort’s lieutenant in duel?

Molly Weasley told Andromeda that had she not been there to take on Bellatrix, she would have done so herself. After all, that witch had nearly killed her Ginny too - but she had killed Tonks and therefore, Andromeda had more reason for revenge. Besides, she was family. Now she was part of their family too.

Harry Potter asked Andromeda for duelling lessons himself one day, a year after the war. But even after he had learned all she taught him, he tried to never get in too bad of a fight with her, for who knew what else she had not taught him.

Ginny Weasley, much like her boyfriend, learned much from Andromeda, perhaps even more than he had. Because unlike him, she had never been shy about also learning the dark spells, the ones she would never use but for which she seemed to have a knack. It was their secret, and one no one ever learned but that had them in giggles every time Harry or Ron had yet again made a mistake that would earn them an intimidated scolding from both women.

Minerva McGonagall tried several times to recruit Andromeda as the defense teacher but was declined every single time. She still went over for tea every other friday so they could chat about this and that but very nearly never about the war.

Teddy Lupin grew up with his Nana who loved him to pieces and told him stories about his Mum and Dad who were very fierce fighters that tried to make a better world for him. He also grew up on secret stories from his godfather about his Nana being the one who killed the lieutenant of the Dark Lord - and that was in the history books anyway. He grew up on stories of his Aunt Bella Black who had been a fierce little girl with shining eyes and his Nan’s face and Aunt Cissa’s smile. He was long gone for school by the time he finally put together the pieces, that Aunt Bella was the one Bellatrix Lestrange who killed his mum and was defeated by his nan. When he learned, he bit his lip and nearly burst into tears before he swallowed them down. What did it all matter? His nan was his nan and she would always be.

Teddy Lupin never told his grandmother that he knew she had killed her sister, even if he knew she knew he knew. He still smiled when he was told stories about the three little Black girls who wanted to take on the world and never be forgotten.

And in a way, each one of them would always be remembered.

**Author's Note:**

> And that's that. I hope you enjoyed it!


End file.
